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Ex-Navy lingust pleads guilty in secret documents case

A former Navy contract linguist accused of removing classified documents from a secure space at a base in Bahrain pled guilty Friday to a misdemeanor charge of taking classified documents without authority.

James Hitselberger, 57, entered the plea during a morning hearing in front of U.S. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras.

Prosecutor Tom Bednar said that while working as an Arabic linguist for the Navy in Bahrain, Hitselberger printed a couple of documents classified "secret" off of a classified computer system, stuffed them in his backpack, and attempted to walk out of the secure work area. "Hitselberger was not allowed to take classified documents and materials outside the restricted access area," Bednar said.

"Do you wish to plead guilty or not guilty?" Contreras asked the defendant after the government laid out its version of the facts.

"I wish to plead guilty, your honor," Hitselberger said.

The charge to which Hitselberger pled guilty covered only two documents, but earlier charges in the case accused him of taking other documents and of sending some classified documents to a public archive at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. There was little light shed on Hitselberger's motives during Friday's hearing.

What is clear is that Hitselberger now faces a vastly reduced punishment when compared with what he could have received if convicted on all the charges the government was leveling prior to the plea deal, including violations of the Espionage Act. Contreras said the misdemeanor charge Hitselberger admitted to carries a maximum penalty of one year in prison and a fine of up to $100,000.

As noted here on Thursday, Hitselberger now faces less jail time than he would already have served if he had been kept in custody as the government requested earlier in the case. The judge took interest Friday in how much time Hitselberger already served: roughly two months in jail after his arrest and about eight months on house arrest before his conditions of release were relaxed last August.

Contreras may have been taking note of the substantial reduction in the charges in the case when he offered praise for Hitselberger's public defender, Mary Petras, early in the hearing.

After asking the defendant if he was satisified with his attorney and hearing that he was, the judge said: "You should be. She's done a tremendous job."